Percy Jackson and the Olympians Fansite

What’s the possibility of a sequel or more? Well, Chris Columbus said that he would like to get to work right away if The Lightning Thief film does well. Which means we could see The Sea of Monsters in 2012.

They also talk about how people are angry about the plot changes, and character changes from the book. I would like to say I was worried they would do what they did, but the film was done in a way that was surprising and spectacular with the CGI. It kept me guessing the whole time, and I’ve read the book like 5 times.

It also seems, after this article, that the Logan Lerman for Spider-Man rumors are squashed.

Anyways, here’s the article!

There’s been a lot of Percy Jackson 2 talk in recent weeks. So what has been said and how likely is a sequel?

There are five books in the Percy Jackson series, so far. The next installment is ‘The Sea Of Monsters’ which sees Percy, Annabeth, and his half-brother Tyson the cyclopes sailing across a dangerous ocean to save the kidnapped Grover and retrieve the Golden Fleece (the only thing that can stop Camp Half-Blood being made vulnerable to an attack by the Titans).

At the London press conference last week director Chris Columbus said “If we are successful enough, I’d love to make another film almost immediately with these guys. We had a wonderful time. I love the enthusiasm and lack of cynicism. I want to go back to work quickly.”

And despite recent Spider-Man casting rumours, it doesn’t sound like star Logan Lerman is going anywhere either. “I’m invested into the whole series. I’m crazy about the story and crazy about the character, I’d love to do all the films.”

The reaction to the first film has been mixed. Critics gave it a 49% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Casual members of the public seemed to half enjoy it. But many fans are angry. According to the feedback on this site and elsewhere, the book wasn’t just compressed (ala Harry Potter), it was “butchered”, its “heart taken out” with major plot re-routing, some characters altered beyond recognition, other key ones dropped entirely, etc. How this will affect repeat viewings and word of mouth we will have to see.

Lightning Thief has made $31 million on its opening weekend in the U.S. Not terrible, but not spectacular either. Internationally it opened with $28 million, which is underwhelming. It cost around $95 million. As of today, it needs to hold on well domestically and internationally to become a hit. If it does, there will be more.

[Source: Movie-Moron]

The LATimes Blog has done an article on Kevin McKidd and his roles in Percy Jackson among others. It’s great to read him talking about filming the movie, and the detail that was put into it. He said the hope is that it would be a trilogy…. um, hopefully that’s just the LAtimes getting it wrong and not Mr. McKidd. Because as we all know, it’s a five book series.

And he also talks about how there was a scene in the script where Percy and Poseidon hug, but Logan felt that that wouldn’t work since this was the start of the father/son relationship. And it’s also funny reading how Sean Bean (Zeus) while filming would just start cracking up, and couldn’t stop. It’s strange reading that, because I’ve always seen Mr. Bean as a serious man. And Mr. McKidd, the movie was awesome, and I think it will do fantastic in the box office!

Anyways, here’s the article on Mr. McKidd!

If you want to know what it’s like to be a television star, walk down a Los Angeles sidewalk with Kevin McKidd, who “Grey’s Anatomy” fans instantly recognize as the tortured trauma surgeon Owen Hunt. If you want to know what it’s like to be a movie star, listen to McKidd describe a solitary stroll he took on a New York street during the filming of “Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lighting Thief.”

“There’s a shot where I arrive in the city and walk up out of the ocean,” says McKidd, who portrays Poseidon in the modern-day adventure with gods of Greek myth. “It was one of those moments as an actor where you say, ‘Wow, I am making a big movie.’ There was a huge crane for this one big, long shot of me and the city skyline as I’m walking toward the Empire State building. The preliminary work was, like, two or three weeks getting the lighting just right on all of these buildings.”

McKidd, with a wink and a sly smile, said it’s a day at the office he won’t soon forget. “I felt pretty special after that shot.”

The 36-year-old McKidd has high hopes that “Percy Jackson,” which opened Friday, might become a franchise just like the bestselling bookshelf series of the same name by author Rick Riordan. The film chronicles the adventures of a young boy who might remind some moviegoers of Harry Potter — both are young outsiders who discover they have a supernatural heritage and then get an education at a magical sanctuary while battling mysterious forces with the help of young friends.

Instead of a boy-wizard, young Percy (played by teen heartthrob Logan Lerman) is a demi-god, the son of mortal woman (Catherine Keener) and Poseidon, the god of the seas. If the movie does click and becomes a trilogy as hoped, it would mark another new chapter in McKidd’s peripatetic career, which began with a memorable turn as a member of the hard-luck junkie crew in “Trainspotting” and reached its zenith, as least in the eyes of critics, with his lead performance as Lucius Vorenus on the HBO series “Rome.”

The Scotsman said he has a sort of compartmentalized celebrity now. Women know him from “Grey’s,” men for “Rome” and youngsters, he suspects, will soon be referring to him as “Percy’s father.” With two children of his own, ages 7 and 9, he’s finding that the tour of duty holding the trident has a lot of traction with the elementary- and middle-school crowd.

“My son has read all of the books and he is immersed in it, like a lot of kids,” McKidd said. “It’s going to be interesting to see how the film does.the hope it will be a trilogy.”

Poseidon is an absentee father to Jackson in the film and that strained relationship is the defining theme in the movie, which finds Percy and his friends caught in the middle of impending war between the gods, who never left earth even though they keep a far lower profile. McKidd said that young Lerman, who was also in “3:10 to Yuma,” is a star in making — the elder actor was impressed that the teenager spoke up about a pivotal scene where his character and Poseidon were supposed to embrace for the first time.

“It’s this ‘Kramer vs. Kramer’ moment and Logan said, ‘I don’t think at this point my character would do that, I think he would just go as far a shaking hands, this is the start of their relationship’ and I was impressed that someone of his age would recognize that and not just go along with what on the script page,” McKidd said. “At that age, I would have said, ‘The script says hug, let’s hug.’ His instincts for his age are amazing. I was so uncomfortable at that age in front of a camera. He’s very grown up in his choices.”

Director Chris Columbus, who also directed the first two “Potter” films, said that McKidd brought a “quiet power” to the role fo the sea god and that his experience in historical roles gave him the gravity needed to be a Greek statue come to life. Still, Mckidd said he Sean Bean, who plays Zeus, had a rough time during one scene keeping a straight face despite their years of experience.

“There’s a scene where we meet and we glare each other and the music is going and the lightning and I walk up and say, ‘Zeus,’ and he greets me, ‘Poseidon,’ and and after a couple of takes we started chatting just about how silly it all is,” McKidd said. “Now Sean is a real giggler. Once he starts he can’t stop. He’s this intense actor, right, but when he starts giggling…and that happens and this not a cheap scene, this is expensive. And there we are laughing…”

McKidd moved stateside almost three years ago to take on the lead role in “Journeyman,” the short-lived NBC time-travel series. That opportunity sprung from his acclaimed work in “Rome,” but it was “Grey’s,” where he plays a former battlefield doctor, that he connected with his largest audience. His character is dealing with post-traumatic stress and relationship challenges with his girlfriend, Cristina Yang, played by, Sandra Oh. McKidd arrived on the show in 2008 and has found it a life-changing role.

“I’m really just like acting I’m not always aware of what is hip and what is popular and what is zeitgeist,” McKidd said. “But ‘Grey’s’ is just a machine. I wasn’t really prepared for the epic nature of how popular the show is. I’ve never been involved in anything with that kind of reach. It’s worldwide now.It’s weird.”

In person, McKidd has a strong accent from his native Elgin, a city on the River Lossie, and he modulates it for his different roles. It’s a bit of a challenge for any actor playing a role of antiquity to pick a voice to speak in, but instead of obsessing about it, he said, the most successful approach is to “keep the regional sound in each actor’s voice” but add a certain formality in the cadence.

“You don’t want to sound like some posh British guy but you do want this heightened, slightly classical form,” McKidd said, who was also in sword-swinging territory with his roles in “The Last Legion” and Ridley Scott’s “Kingdom of Heaven.” “You can’t just walk around acting like you’re in ‘Trainspotting.’ It’s about tone and tonality but if the actors hold on to some of their own regional background it sounds more natural to the audience over the course the movie.”

McKidd left drama school in 1994 and, right away, found himself in the vile and sublime heroin epic “Trainspotting,” based on the Irvine Welsh novel, which was directed by Danny Boyle and featured an Oscar-nominated script by John Hodge. Mckidd played Tommy, a jock who goes into a needle spiral after his girlfriend ditches him for losing a sex tape.

“It was an amazing thing to be part of,” McKidd said. “It was so low-budget, nobody knew it would be that big, not even Danny Boyle. It was a great early gig for an actor… I saw Danny the night he won the Oscar for ‘Slumdog Millionaire ‘ and we had a good laugh and I told him, ‘Do you remember, we had no money at all?’ I was so happy for him. He’s one of the best directors. He was offered a lot of the big franchises but he turned them down so he could do what he wants to do.”

Walking the career line between commercial success and critical satisfaction is an interesting topic.

The early reviews for “Percy” have not been especially kind and there has been a backlash for major plot changes and eliminated characters. “It’s not just that it’s a lot less funny than the book,” Michael O’ Sullivan wrote in the Washington Post, “It’s also a lot less fun.” Kenneth Turan, in the Los Angeles Times, dismissed the film as “generic filmmaking at its most banal.”

McKidd (who was interviewed before the film was screened) said his personal goal is to put together a career that keeps him energized by its surprises. That’s clear with his next big screen appearance: McKidd is also part of the cast of Guy Moshe’s “Bunraku,” a film that melds live-action and animation for a surreal noir tale. The $30 million movie, to be released later this year, takes its name from a Japanese form of puppetry. The cast includes Josh Harnett, Woody Harrelson, Ron Perlman and Demi Moore.

“It’s a very, very strange film,” McKidd said. “It’s a hybrid of a western and a martial arts film. It was also shot in Bucharest on green-screen stages. The world it’s set in is almost circus-like in the feel of it, and it’s all origami. The whole universe is constantly folding paper to create a cityscape or interiors of rooms or the sunrise…. I play a very effeminate master killer who’s almost like a Fred Astaire tap-dancing his way through the movie. It’s so different than anything I’ve done.”

More than anything, McKidd aspires to return to his “Rome” character. The series, which lasted only 22 episodes, was created by Bruno Heller, John Milius and William J. MacDonald and set in the roiling days when Rome was transitioning from a republic to an empire. Heller, the architect behind the CBS hit “The Mentalist,” has a film project in mind that would carry on the tale of the noble, duty-bound solider Vorenus and his friend Titus Pullo (Ray Stevenson), who has more of a pirate’s soul.

“I spoke to Bruno a few days ago and it’s looking good, but the problem is money’s tight in the independent film world right now,” McKidd said. “I hope it will happen, though. If things work, ‘Percy Jackson’ will do well, and then I can do a second one and the ‘Rome’ movie, too. If the gods are willing….”

[Source: LATimes]

Suburban Chicago News did an article on The Lightning Thief. Chris Columbus talking about the film, wanting to make it fun for the parents to take their kids to the movie. I think that’s good, since parents who don’t read the books, when they dish out around $50 to go see a movie with their kids, (that’s not really even including snack costs) they want to enjoy the movie they’re going to see. I think it’s good that he did the first two Harry Potter films, because he knows how to make a movie the whole family will enjoy. Anyways, here you go!

When Chris Columbus decided to adapt a popular children’s book, Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief, he went for the gold.

He optioned Rick Riordan’s best-selling kid lit novel about a teen who discovers he’s the descendant of a Greek god.

It wasn’t until he tested the final product on 8-year-olds could his universe finally relax.

“I screened it a few times for kids just to make sure, and it was a great response. What’s better than a woman with snakes coming out of her head,” says Columbus, referring to Uma Thurman’s Medusa character. “The kids went nuts. I think this is the film I made for my 12-year-old self.”

Calling from Rome on his press tour, Columbus certainly doesn’t have to worry about having his finger on young pulses. After all, he did direct the first two Harry Potter films, not to mention a little Chicago-based movie called “Home Alone.”

Dabbling in Greek mythology was a whole other world for Columbus. “It’s not every movie where you have Uma Thurman running around in a blue shower cap and later animating those snakes that would come out of her head,” he says. “She was thrilled, too, because she wanted to do something for her kids.”

Columbus, whose own kids range in age from 13 to 21, wanted to make a family-friendly film with a few jokes thrown in for the parents. (Medusa tells the son of Poseidon: “I used to date your daddy.”)

In the movie, the gods of Mount Olympus (and assorted creatures) literally walk out of the pages of Percy Jackson’s Greek mythology text and infiltrate his life. Zeus’ (Sean Bean) lightning bolt goes missing and he thinks Percy is to blame, so Percy and his friends have to find the real thief.

“When I first read the book, I loved the idea of combining Greek mythology in a modern, contemporary setting,” Columbus says. “It’s something new because I don’t think kids today have much knowledge of Greek myths.

“I remember learning about it in school, … but first, I had to do my own reading. What I found is that the Greek myths still work on so many different levels.”

Columbus also liked to link the idea that these young Greek gods have the same problems as modern high school students. “There’s nothing really different about what kids struggle through today and what the Greek gods went through,” says actor Logan Lerman, who plays Percy. “It’s all about having people understand you — no matter what. It’s about finding your own power.”

Lerman admits he wasn’t a Greek buff. “My knowledge of Greek mythology is based in eighth-grade history class,” he says. “I didn’t take the time to study it further until this movie.”

Columbus didn’t just make his cast read. They also had to get physical in front of green screens.

“The toughest part of this movie after doing the ‘Harry Potter’ films was to get the special effects just the way I wanted them,” Columbus says.

I didn’t just want to put the kids in front of green screens, but built real sets.”

Columbus is hoping for a good audience response. “We worked on this movie for two years and now comes the hardest part, which is waiting to see if people go to see it,” the director says. “Once I get over that hurdle, I’d love to do the next book in the series, which is called ‘Sea of Monsters.’ But we’ll see.”

One film Columbus won’t be returning to is “Harry Potter.”

“My kids are in high school and I just couldn’t take them out of school and move them to London for three years,” he says. “We did that on the first Potter films when they were young. To do it again and you get that weird Hollywood childhood. I want them to have a regular childhood and they have a good life in San Francisco.”

[Source]

mtv.com reports that Logan Lerman, the titular star of Percy Jackson is in fact, in talks to also portray Peter Parker/Spider Man in the franchise reboot. Like he says, it’s only been little conversations, and it will be a while before we find out if he in fact will be playing two titular characters in the franchises. What do you think? Should/could he juggle two major franchises? I think it would be cool if he got the part of Spider Man.

Logan Lerman, the star of “Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief,” says he’s in talks to play Peter Parker in the upcoming “Spider-Man” movie that will reboot the blockbuster superhero franchise.

“There have been a few discussions, it’s definitely something I’m looking into,” Logan told Access Hollywood.

At 18 years old, Lerman would seem a good fit for the role of a teenage web-slinger in director Marc Webb’s film, though nothing is official at this point regarding his attachment. However, Lerman said he was a big fan of the famous Marvel hero.

What do you all think… could you see Logan in this role? I guess time will tell.

“It’s one of my favorite characters ever and I’m a huge fan of the series,” he said. “I’d love to have more conversations about it. I’m definitely very interested in it.”

“It’s just, you know, conversations are starting,” he added. “It’s a long process with the studio and the producers and everything. But it’s definitely a project that I’m really interested in, of course. I’d love to focus on the human element a little bit more. It’d be such a fun experience.”

[Source: MTV]

On The Lightning Thief’s page on fandango.com, they have posted the official run time for the film. It’s at a precise 2 hour length. I think that’s pretty sweet. Personally, I like really long movies, and anything under 2 hr and 30 min is a bit short for me, especially with films adapted from books. I know there a lot of people though that like shorter films, and I’ll admit there are some 2&1/2 hr films that I came out of thinking, “Man, they could have cut that down by an hour and it would have been terrific”.

But like I said, with book adaptions, 2 hr is just a bit short. All well, I’m still sure it’ll be terrific. And let us not forget what the late Alfred Hitchcock said: “The duration of a film should be directly related to the endurance of the human bladder”. Yeah, pretty good quote eh? What do you think of the runtime?

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mb.com has posted an article about dyslexia and ADHD and how it plays a big part in Percy Jackson. We don’t really hear about people with dyslexia or ADHD, at least I don’t. so to hear that several people working on this film have children who have dyslexia is interesting, and an eye opener.

Uma Thurman’s daughter is dyslexic, Rick Riordan’s son is dyslexic and has ADHD and it was this reason that inspired Percy Jackson. And in an interview we posted earlier, we found out that Chris Columbus’ daughter is dyslexic.

Originally woven and written for his child, Rick Riordan’s best selling book series “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” now forms part of society’s answer to dyslexia among the young.

The novels draw on Riordan’s experience with his son, who was diagnosed with ADHD and dyslexia.

After recounting the stories of gods and heroes, he ran out of myths and his son asked him to make up a new story.

Over the course of a few nights the story of Percy Jackson came to life and at the suggestion of his son, he wrote what became “The Lightning Thief.”

Now a major motion picture, 20th Century Fox brings to life Greek mythology’s gods and goddesses with a contemporary twist in the most unusual and highly entertaining way helmed by “Harry Potter’s” original director Chris Columbus.

The story centers on an unusual hero, Percy Jackson (Logan Lerman), who at first appears to be an ordinary (actually struggling) teenager. In fact, we soon learn that he is the son of the great god of the sea, Poseidon (Kevin McKidd). His mother is a mortal woman, Sally Jackson (Catherine Keener).

Percy, who suffers from dyslexia, is forced to confront his destiny because Zeus (Sean Bean) is convinced that this teenager is responsible for stealing his precious and all-powerful lightning bolt.

As a result, Percy is swept up in a battle between the mighty, legendary deities. To make matters even more complicated, Hades (Steve Coogan) has kidnapped his mother, Sally. Percy must prove his innocence, avert an epic conflict and rescue his mother.

“In the beginning you find out he’s just like any kid with a learning disability, he has dyslexia. He’s had to overcome those difficulties his whole life and you find out that this disability actually works to his advantage as a demigod. The film really has a universal theme, because everybody goes through this kind of journey of trying to find out who they are. That’s really the underlying theme of the whole film along with a lot of action, adventure, and Greek mythology,” says Lerman.

First he must go to a special retreat for others like him: Camp Half Blood. Then he embarks on his perilous expedition: supported by his childhood friend, Grover (Brandon Jackson). It turns out that Grover himself is no mere mortal. He is a courageous satyr. Also on the journey is another demigod: Annabeth (Alexandra Daddario), daughter of the goddess Athena.

EMPOWERING THE DYSLEXIC

The all-out adventure also includes share along with the other cast a passion for empowering the dyslexic. Uma Thurman who plays Medusa thinks this is great because she has a daughter who’s dyslexic and she herself was a dyslexic.

“This is a very empowering idea for children and is a subject very close to me. It is hard for children who are wonderful but who have something that challenges them, which makes it hard for them to feel equal and can make them feel inadequate because of the way in which we choose to educate and learn.”

She continues that being dyslexic can be incredibly discouraging because there’s a huge range or spectrum, but many dyslexics are highly articulate, highly verbal people and very expressive.

“They have extreme gifts in that area. And if you find yourself shut out from being able to express your thoughts and unable to read the thoughts of others, it is difficult. By the way, being a powerful oral learner is incredible too, it is part of what makes me an actress.”

Rosario Dawson, on the other hand, finds it interesting that there are nine-year-olds with cell phones these days and kids are becoming mature at a younger age and the correlation with the increasing number of kids getting diagnosed with conditions like ADD (attention deficit disorder).

“So I think kids have to be so cognizant of what their gifts are. It is appealing to put a twist on all of that.”

[Source: MB.com]

The MPAA (Motion Pictures Association of America) has at last released the rating for The Lightning Thief. Can I have a drumroll please? (druminggggggg drummmmmmmming, drummmmmmmmmmmminngggggggg!) It has been rated:

PG for action violence and peril, some scary images and suggestive material, and mild language.

What do you think? The first 3 and the 6th Harry Potter’s were rated PG as well. So were The Chronicles of Narnia. I think that’s right, because if it were rated PG13 the younger kids who have read the book probably would not be able to see it.

Here’s a quick update to our recent post for Nintendo’s announcement of the upcoming The Lightning Thief DS game. Amazon.com has added a preview of the new game to accompany their pre-order page! It looks pretty cool. It almost seems like a turn based fighting game similar to the ‘Final Fantasy’ series. As you will notice, the preview is a bit small, but from what we can see it looks pretty sweet! We’ll post more on this game, as the news comes.

It is for pre-order by amazon.com for $30.

Here’s the preview. If it doesn’t start on its own, just click it to get it playing.

Nintendo announced their video game lineup for most of 2010. Along with many other games, they announced that Percy Jackson and the Olympians will come out for the DS on February 2nd!

No news if The Lightning Thief is also planned for the Wii, or other systems. What do you think? I’m pretty excited.

It should be pretty fun to run around New York City as a demigod to save the world.

With a strong cast and exciting plot, fans and critics are speculating that the Percy Jackson series could be the next Harry Potter. As fans, we hope this will be true, but time will tell. What do you think?

Many have tried and failed to bring the so-called “next Harry Potter” to the big screen. The Chronicles of Narnia came close, but interest in the second film, Prince Caspian, considerably waned from the first. (The first grossed $291.7 million domestically, compared to the second’s $141.6 million — still impressive, but less so.) Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events should have been promising, but suffered in transferring the series’ sardonic tone. And The Spiderwick Chronicles probably was too similar to Potter itself to reach blockbuster status.

Fans hope for Harry Potter success

So now we have news that Pierce Brosnan and Uma Thurman have joined the cast of the Percy Jackson movie adaptation…which is being directed by Chris Columbus…who directed the first two Potter pictures, Sorcerer’s Stone and Chamber of Secrets. (Nevermind they are often considered the weakest entries in the series.) Brosnan, Thurman and a host of other actors will play Greek gods in the adaptation of Rick Riordan’s first Percy Jackson novel, The Lightning Thief. In it, the half-human son of Poseidon (Percy, to be played by Logan Lerman) embarks on a quest to prevent war between the gods of Mount Olympus. Thurman will play Medusa, which already seems like a stroke of genius. All of which leads to the question: Could this finally be the next big family fantasy franchise?

With Columbus at the helm, Percy Jackson will certainly be big, loud, noisy and not at all subtle, but there’s hope: Lerman is a talented young actor (you might’ve seen him in 3:10 to Yuma, or the short-lived series Jack & Bobby), and the film’s premise sounds fresh. There will be no goblins or trolls or Christ-like lions, just awesomely-powerful Greek gods. Sign me up! The fifth and final book in author Riordan’s series, to be titled The Last Olympian, is due in stores in May — plenty of time to generate buzz for the movie’s February 2010 release. But what do you think, Percy-philes? Are you excited for your beloved series to hit the big screen? And for those of you who haven’t read, do you think Percy Jackson has the makings of a Harry Potter-sized hit?

[Source: Popwatch]